Willow's Tale
by Willow Redfern
Summary: When Willow inadvertantly casts a spell to communicate with Jenny, the only other witch she knew, it all goes wrong in the pattern of many of her spells to this point.
1. In the Ether

The swirls of time and space moved around aimlessly. Through the mists were indistinguishable figures of those who have been and must still be. A time and space for every entity in this place devoid of time and space in terms such as a mortal should ever understand. Physical form equals to naught, nothing like black hair, nothing like oval shaped eyes, beauty, fame, figure, all naught. Nothing. Left behind. Left.  
  
The haze fills and ebbs away like a tide of white film. Motions of the sea recreated in imitation. The breeze that passes through the trees, lifts the hair, whispers that sound to thine ear that no longer does exist. Thine eyes shall see no more of that. Not now. Not here.  
  
This is death. Unfinished. Business still waited upon, consuming the thoughts of those vacant minds, still preoccupied.  
  
A woman formerly known as Miss Jenny Calender by many had been having outside contact through the veil for many shifts now. So many things left unsaid. At least she had been given the chance to speak of her love before her fated night. The entity she remained had long ago forgotten the sensation of human touch, of human feeling. But yet, the remembrance of emotions felt in times 'before' were enough to keep her here. She had begun to wonder if she would never be freed, before the young witch had found a way to reach out to her.  
  
Again, the entity felt the now familiar pull preceding the communication with the mortal.  
  
".Hear me,  
  
Receive my plea,  
  
And answer me."  
  
The candle flickered around Willow's room with the words that she spoke. Allow a smile of self-satisfaction, the young and upcoming witch knew that she had achieved contact again. Not bad so far!  
  
Knowing her audience, she started speaking the words that had caused her to call to her old high school teacher in the first place.  
  
"Sometimes I think that he will never get over you," Willow said softly but sincerely. "He acts that everything is fine and normal, and when something bad is happening for us to battle, his mind is taken off it, but then, when we all go back home and back to uni, his lonely overcomes him again and he misses you."  
  
Willow paused, waiting to see if her visitor wished to make comment on these words. When she was faced only with the usual silence, she continued.  
  
"Buffy told me something once. Something that Giles said the day that he buried you and both of them stood by your grave. Buffy worried about him. She worried about a lot in that time. Some of her worry was even due to the fact that she had never given the chance to forgive you before you died." Willow paused again, before quoting Giles. "At your grave that day, he told Buffy, 'In my years as Watcher, I've buried.too many people. Jenny was the first I'd loved.' If you can, if it is at all possible, you have to let Giles know that you are okay. He needs that much."  
  
Willow sighed, standing up when still no reply was made.  
  
"I guess, though, that if you could have done that, you would have done it many years ago now, huh?" she said sadly. "But then, love is never fair, is it?"  
  
She moved forward to blow out the candle directly in front of her, allowing herself a moment to get her emotions under control. Thoughts of Oz still came to her mind too often for comfort. Willow prepared herself for the sending off part of the ritual.  
  
"I release you of this place,  
  
Consent your travel through time and space."  
  
As she blew out the last candle in her room, the bedroom was given to darkness. Willow cleared up most of the things from the floor, before standing up and getting herself into bed.  
  
A whispering above her head followed her into the dreamscape. 


	2. Coming back

Willow woke up in the middle of the night, Buffy was sleeping in the bed next to hers, and a soft wind was coming through the open dorm window.  
  
Something was nagging Willow, something that she couldn't quite make out. It was like she had forgotten something, like she had to do something that very instant . . . but she couldn't remember what it was.  
  
Willow sat up in bed and thought hard, she knew that she couldn't sleep until she did what she had to do. She thought back, tried to remember something, but nothing came.  
  
She retraced the day in her mind, she had gotten up, went to class, came back to the room to study, went to see Giles, found a picture of Miss Calendar in the living room, came home, tried to contact Miss. Calendar . . . but that hadn't worked, she hadn't felt anything, she hadn't sensed anything, the spell was a failure. Maybe she had to try it again, maybe Jenny was pleading to make contact and Willow could feel the invisible words travelling through parallel dimensions.  
  
Quickly, Willow pushed back the covers and got out of bed. She moved quickly and silently, determined to make the spell work this time. She opened the trunk at the bottom of her bed and pulled out a bag of herbs and several candles, matches.  
  
She moved to the bathroom and spread out the candles in a circle, she would need a circle of protection this time, this time she would case Miss Calendar to appear, make her spirit make a quick stop to say 'hello'.  
  
Taking the herbs out of the bag and sprinkling it on her head and then over the candles, Willow began chanting:  
  
"Those we love have passed, but they have not passed far. Come to me my friend, come and speak. Miss Jenny Calendar is the one I seek, Miss Jenny Calendar is the one that I need to see. Come, come."  
  
Willow had closed her eyes during the spell, concentrating on seeing Miss Calendar again, forcing herself to imagine her standing right in front of her, right outside the circle of candles. She wasn't sure what would happen in the spell had worked correctly, all she felt was a soft breeze ruffle her hair. Slowly, she opened her eyes and gasped out loud, knocking over a candle in her momentary shock. The remainder of the candles were extinguished simultaneously.  
  
There stood Jenny Calendar, staring down at Willow. But her expression didn't see to fit the joyous reunion, Jenny was frowning.  
  
"Miss Calendar?"  
  
"Willow."  
  
"So . . . how are you doing?" Willow was grasping for words, she couldn't think of what to say to a spirit that she had just summoned. She knew she should have thought of something to say previous to the spell.  
  
"You wouldn't understand."  
  
"Understand what?"  
  
"Understand how I was, it's a little more complicated than feeling happy or sad, but now that I'm back in contact with this world, I am starting to remember what it felt like to be mortal. I remember the pain and the fear and the--"  
  
"How about the love you felt for Giles, uh, Rupert Giles, the librarian the Sunnydale High were you worked?" Willow asked, not wanting the grim list to continue, she was well acquainted with all of those horrid emotions.  
  
"Rupert Giles, the librarian." Jenny said thoughtfully. "Yes . . . love, I remember. But then there was the hatred . . . the anger--"  
  
"NO! He's not still mad at you! He's not, he's not mad anymore! He loves you and misses you and feels bad for being angry with you when you died."  
  
Jenny shook her head, "Why am I here? Why would you pull me from my rest?"  
  
"To tell Giles that you love him, so he won't be so sad anymore."  
  
"Love? I'm incapable of love anymore, emotions are mere memories to me now. Nothing matters, not love, not fear, not pain, not joy, nothing matters when you die." Jenny replied coldly.  
  
Willow stared in shock and shook her head. "I'm sorry, disperse." She tried to end the spell, to send Jenny back to where she had been. But it didn't work, Jenny didn't fade, didn't disappear, nothing happened. "Disperse!" Nothing happened.  
  
"Send me back now, I don't want to be here in this place of feeling, emotions are too complicated, I don't want them!" Jenny screamed, noticing the failure of Willow's words.  
  
"Disperse!" Nothing happened.  
  
"Oh no," Willow groaned. Another spell gone wrong. Was she ever going to get the hang of this stuff? "Look, I think I need to do some more research," she said to Jenny, who was looking sort of bereft where she stood. "I know someone, a pretty powerful wicca who might be able to help out. Can you stay here while I try to figure this out with her?" she asked.  
  
"I suppose that I will have to, won't I Willow?" Jenny said. Willow could hear the censure in her old teacher's voice and winced. She would just about give anything for this not to have happened. The next best thing would be for her to fix all of this out before Giles or any of the others found out.  
  
Buffy!  
  
"You can't stay here and wait though!" she said urgently. "Buffy will be back soon, and..."  
  
"Would you prefer me to sit in the closet while I wait for you to come back?" Jenny said ironically.  
  
Willow looked at her carefully, trying to gauge the sort of tone and how she should react to it. In the end, she just bowed her head.  
  
"I won't be long. And then maybe I can get you to this friend of mine's room without Buffy ever being the wiser. But for now..." She didn't know how to end that sentence.  
  
"For now the closet shall be my refuge." Jenny turned away before Willow could see her face this time, and stepped into the closet.  
  
"I won't be long," Willow repeated, standing there a moment longer, before turning and fleeing to the library where she was sure she'd find Tara.  
  
Halfway to the library, she felt a slight dizziness that she just passed off as nerves and pushed aside. Minutes later, as she stood in front of the library doors, she passed out. 


	3. Unwelcomed welcome company

"Oh my god! Willow! Can you hear me? Willow, please wake up! Oh gods, somebody, help me!"  
  
Tara shook her friend in fear over what may have happened to her. How long had she been lying there like this, she didn't even want to think! And why wasn't anyone coming over to help her out?  
  
"Please, could somebody get the nurse?" she pleaded to anyone walking past, but achieved no more than the strange passing glance from University goers who had better things on their minds.  
  
"I've got to get you somewhere safe. But how?" Tara mused to herself. "Oh Willow, won't you please just wake up? Wait, of course."  
  
As subtly as she could make in whilst in the middle of a crowded area, Tara cast a lower level spell to animate the body while keeping brain functions still as they were. This achieved, it would be relatively easy to walk Willow back to her own dorm where she could try to figure out what was really wrong with her. She just hoped that it wasn't anything serious!  
  
"You're burning up, Will. What can I do for you?"  
  
Tara had lain Willow down on her own bed and revoked the spell from effect just in case that worsened her condition. Her vitals appeared to be ebbing, she was breathing only very shallowly. Tara decided then to look into her aura and her energy, to see how far the damage really went.  
  
"Oh no," she whispered under her breath. Her aura was paling, growing thinner and even breaking away in sections. But it was the state of her energy that confounded her.  
  
Strips of energy seemed to be taking their leave of Willow's body and trailing off and away to... somewhere else. Even as Tara sat beside her, she could see wisps of energy flowing out of the window to this unseen source. Willow was being drained, to a very critical level! She could have siphoned off her own energy, but there was no way to know that that wouldn't seep away in time also. There was only so much that Tara would be able to offer before she too turned to a crucial level.  
  
She had to tell Willow's friends. Only, she didn't really know them. At all. She'd heard all about them, but had no way of knowing if they knew anything about her. And what if they didn't? What if they thought that it was her doing this to Willow? And without Willow to argue it for her? She could be getting into more trouble than ever if that happened. But she couldn't just sit here and do nothing! There had to be some way for her to find out what this thing taking Willow's energy was, even without the Sc- scoobies.  
  
Tara made her decision quickly and decisively. If Willow had gotten hurt and the so called Scoobies had been the first to find her, they would never have thought to let Tara know about it, so why should she have to report to them now? Besides, she was sure that she could figure all of this out without their help.  
  
Just as she'd decided on a spiritual cause of action and was about to step into her aura and take in the vantage point from there, a sound escaped from Willow's lips.  
  
"What sweetie?" Tara asked, leaning in closer.  
  
"Sp...ike..." she repeated.  
  
Tara sat back in shock. She was calling for Spike? Or saying that Spike had done this to her? Well, it would make sense, from all accounts he was evil and everything but... whatever had done this would need a whole lot of magical power to get it done. She just wasn't sure that Spike had access to that kind of power!  
  
"Spike, honey?" Tara asked, trying to make sure that that was exactly what she had really said. Looking out the side window, she saw that it was growing into twilight. Better not be Spike who had done this to her, Tara thought, otherwise she was almost certain he would be coming back to finish what he had started soon enough.  
  
"Want... Spike..." Willow's eyes flickered, but they didn't actually open. Tara chewed on her lip in worry. Well, that sounded less like the 'he had done this to her' theory, but it was still worrying that she would call for him while she way in a way like this.  
  
"But honey, Spike is..." Tara didn't quite know how to go on from here. "Spike is... not a good person to have around right now." Twilight grew darker. It was always amazing at how quickly Sunnydale could go from full light to total darkness every night. Tara looked out the window again in consternation. Perhaps choosing against going after the Scoobies by light hadn't been the best idea after all. Now it was surely too late. Maybe for both of them!  
  
Willow moaned softly, and tossed back and forwards on the bed that Tara had set her upon. Tara's lip trembled. It killed her to see Willow like this. What if something happened to her, and she never got to tell her how she really felt...?  
  
"Bloody hell, what are you doing to Red?" a deep and familiar voice said from behind them both.  
  
Tara gasped and spun around, instinctively protecting Willow with her own body.  
  
"S-spike," she stuttered in her fear. "Wha-what are you... how did you get here so fast?"  
  
"Don't be a stupid little bint!" Spike told her impatiently, stalking around her to get a glimpse in at Willow. "I could feel the chit's trouble from the other side of town. Couldn't keep myself away, not after that. Even if the slayer had been..."  
  
Spike drifted off, but he had already said enough. Too much, Tara thought, as she looked at the way the vampire was looking at her redhead love lying on the bed. She seemed almost more restful there now that he was in the room, even though she hadn't yet opened her eyes to see him. Her breath caught in her throat. Evidently the Scoobies hadn't been the worse choice after all.  
  
Spike turned around to face her once again. "How long has she been here like this?" he asked sharply.  
  
"I-I don't know," Tara bumbled. "I was a-at the lib-bray and found her... like she is now. I managed to get her b-back here, and sh-she's been like this ever since.  
  
Spike stepped down beside the bed, and took Willow's little hand within his. His jaw hardened.  
  
"I'll kill it. Whatever is doing this to her, I'll kill it. Just you wait and see!"  
  
"H-how long have you two been... been...?" Tara tried to ask, but was unable to actually get the question out the way she wanted to.  
  
Spike looked up at her again, his eyes narrowed as if not quite understanding her question for a moment. Then his forehead cleared as understanding dawned.  
  
"It's not like that," he admitted grudgingly, looking back down at her, tenderness in his eyes. "I never told her yet. She doesn't know."  
  
Just as he obviously didn't know how she'd been calling his name earlier on, Tara thought, although she didn't say anything. While neither of them knew about the other, there was still a chance... still a chance that...  
  
"Stupid werewolf never deserved her," Spike continued, rubbing a calloused thumb back and forth over the back of her hand. "Never knew what he had in her. Not like I did. Do."  
  
Tara stepped back a few paces, feeling for the wall of the room behind her. She couldn't just stand here anymore. She needed to do something, anything!  
  
"Uh, I'm just going to let the Sc-coobies know about this," she told him to his back. "I think that maybe... maybe they should know."  
  
"You're probably right," Spike said. "I'll wait here until you come back. Just don't tell the slayer that I was here, alright? Don't want her knowing just yet. I can be gone as soon as I smell her in the hall."  
  
"Okay then," Tara said slowly, before turning around and fixing her hand on the doorknob, eager to get out of the room. 


	4. What do you do?

"Tara? Tara, where are you going?"  
  
Tara's hand halted on the doorknob, growing slowly numb as she realised that now she was going to have to stay in the room and deal with the situation that had arisen. Perhaps if she was able to keep everything on a stable note...  
  
"Spike? What are you doing in here?" Willow sat up in feared surprise, yanking her hand from his as if it suddenly burned.  
  
Nope, no hope of keeping emotions down now, Tara thought, trying not to take overt notice of the hurt expression that came over Spike's face. He masked it quickly though, falling back on his usually crassness.  
  
"Well look, I thought you might be dying... that there might be some blood in it for me after all. I mean, it would still be warm if I got in quick enough. Warm blood, you don't know how much I miss the taste of that!"  
  
With every word that came over of his mouth, Willow grew to look more and more horrified. Even Spike, who was saying the words, seemed unable to control the flow, and when he finally cut it off, he looked shocked at what he had said.  
  
"I didn't mean..." he tried to appeal.  
  
"Get out!" Willow cried, pointing her finger over at the door. "Now! You are not invited. Stay the hell away from me, okay?"  
  
Tara opened her mouth to say something, then wondered what she could possibly say, especially seeing as how she really didn't want to keep Spike in the room any longer than necessary.  
  
Spike cast a look across to look at her. She immediately lowered her gaze and avoided all possibility of meeting his eyes. His expression went cold, emotionless.  
  
"Fine," he all but growled. "Not as though I wanted to stay in here any longer anyway. Got places to be, people to stalk, you know how it is."  
  
Without waiting a moment longer, Spike stormed from the room, his trench coat flapping after him. Tara closed her eyes in a grimace as the door slammed behind him. When she opened them again, Willow looked so bereft that she couldn't help herself from saying something.  
  
"Look, maybe it's best that he went after all. I'm sure he didn't mean those things anymore than he meant for those emotions to get out of control," she said softly, crossing the room until she was again at Willow's side.  
  
Willow shook her head.  
  
"That doesn't matter. We've got more important things to follow up," she said, falling back against the pillows, her face growing pale. "Call the Scoobies. Tell them to get here as fast as they can. We've got some major trouble coming up!"  
  
*  
  
Disorientated, Jenny walked through the somewhat familiar streets of Sunnydale. Everything was so much brighter than she remembered. So much harder. Louder than everything she recalled. Was it just being gone from this place that gave her this perspective, or had it always been thus?  
  
She realised she had to face facts. She could remember the red head witch she had left behind two years ago, and that was hardly the kind of witch one was reasonably able to pine all her hopes on. Why, nice girl that she was, Willow hadn't even wanted to bring Buffy into it. Buffy who might have been able to help. Buffy who might have brought Giles into it.  
  
Ah, but she remembered Giles. So much so that it hurt. Jenny couldn't remember it ever hurting where she had been before here, so why now? She had to find something that could be done about it. She wasn't meant to be here. It was no longer her time. She should be waiting somewhere to be reborn, not aimlessly walking the streets of a vampire hideout town.  
  
Perhaps if she looked up some of the members of her gypsy tribe. Surely there were still some about? She knew that Angelus had killed some, but surely he had not been so thorough as to... but why not? He had done it before, why not again?  
  
As moments passed, Jenny grew more and more agitated where she stood, and she realised that she knew nothing of this time, nothing of what had passed.  
  
As she saw a car driving towards her, she realised she knew nothing of the current dangers of the world surrounding her.  
  
*  
  
Xander and Anya drove by on the way to Tara's somewhat urgent summons to Willow's dorm room. Apparently some witchy spell gone wrong? Xander wasn't sure, he hadn't been able to make a great deal of sense out of Tara's stutters, but all the same, he had gotten an idea that whatever it was, it was serious. He had rounded up a grumbling Anya as quickly as could be managed and the next thing they knew, they were on the road to Operation: Help Willow.  
  
So focused on this goal was he that he didn't see a dark haired woman wondering in the middle of the street until he almost ran her over. Only Anya's hysterical cry alerted him to her presence before it was too late.  
  
"Oh God, Xander! What were you thinking?" Anya demanded, turning a terrified but incensed glare towards him. "You could have run that poor lady over! Aren't you even going to go back and say sorry?"  
  
Xander wiped a sweaty palm over his face and turning his head back over the chair to glance out the back window. What he saw there in that moment stunned him.  
  
"Xander! Are you trying to run us into an accident?" Anya asked shrilly. "You know, because it isn't hard enough that I'm no longer going to live forever, you have to hasten that oncoming mortal death today?"  
  
"I'm sorry, An," Xander murmured as he turned around, but his eyes flashed up to the rear view mirror. The woman, whoever she had been, was now gone.  
  
Could it be a coincidence that he thought he saw Jenny Calendar just as he was on his way to an urgent wicca going wrong summons? Knowing Willow as he did, he somehow didn't think so. The thought only made his foot press down harder on the accelerator, making Anya yelp out in protest once again.  
  
*  
  
"Okay, I'd like to be the first to say, 'What's going on?" Xander said in Buffy and Willow's dorm room, putting one sharp finger up to emphasise his point. "One does not usually make a habit of almost running over already dead people!"  
  
"Well, I mean, in Sunnydale..." Buffy said sheepishly, referring of course to the undead population walking around.  
  
That deflated Xander slightly, but not for long.  
  
"That's true. But they at least wait for night time, when you come to expect it. I mean this, this was in broad daylight!"  
  
Xander was well on his way to being worked up again. Anya patted him twice on the shoulder, consolingly. Willow had the grace to look uncomfortable.  
  
"Look, this is why I called you all over here." She seemed to have trouble getting the next words out on account of Giles' kind face looking into her. "I think I... somehow brought Jenny back... only now I don't know how to put her away again..."  
  
All the room was silent for a moment. Then a moment more. And then,  
  
"You what!?" Giles suddenly exploded, uncharacteristically the most emotive of them all. "What could you have been thinking of, you stupid girl!"  
  
"Giles!" Buffy retorted sharply.  
  
"Well I'm sorry, but do you have any idea the damage she might have done here? Far worse than some imbecile almost running her over-"  
  
"Hey, I resent that!" Xander cut in.  
  
"-She has already died once. Her time has passed. Do you have any idea what it could do to die twice?" Giles ranted.  
  
Buffy lowered her gaze.  
  
"No," she said bitterly. "I only know what it does to die once." She looked up at her former Watcher with narrowed eyes. "Does that count?"  
  
"Buffy, you know that isn't what I meant," Giles said, softening slightly.  
  
"Isn't it?" Buffy asked with a raised eyebrow. "It seems to me that more what we should be doing right now is trying to find a way to fix this. Not throw blame at one another."  
  
Giles had the grace to look properly chastised.  
  
"Of course. You're, you're quite right," he admitted, though all the same, he couldn't bring himself to look across at Willow who was still laying in her bed looking thoroughly miserable. "So, where do we start?" 


End file.
